Oddly, all other titles, some of which are 9M CBR play fine - the freeze title is sub 9M and the audio is identical to every other title. As well, after powering off and back on again, the title plays just fine.

Is there any difference in the video or audio encoder used?

EDIT

I just noticed your comment that it does play if you power off/on first. Perhaps it is the menu that the old player doesn't like. Can you make a test disc with a simple or no menu and just the troublesome title?

No.

I only have this issue on the one player, but since it (in terms of age, brand, etc.) may represent a significant portion of the viewer's machines out there, I'd like to figure out what is causing this.

Steve. You can type faster than I can think! See my edit above.

I've tried the title separately before and it played fine. You may be onto something with the menu however. According to DVDA one or more linkd overlap on the menu.

Here's the thing: I have 4 music tracks for several of the titles to which the menu links. For appearance, I designed the play buttons to have a 1-4 selector within a simple beveled rectangle. To implement this I simply sliced the image, using one of each segments as a link;: see image below:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/8n7fr07qcda7jw6/menu.jpg?dl=0

For whatever reason DVDA is creating an over-sized reference frame of each segment which is causing the overlap - keep in mind the segments are precisely sliced to fit together seamlessly.

Is there a way to remove or properly scale that annoying DVDA frame so that I can avoid overlapping as described above and not rescaling the segments??

EDIT: Trying the sizing tool to reduce the frame size and relative overlap - I'll burn another disc w/ the revised menu and report back.

Please don't overthink.
Burned DL discs are not compatible with all players.
Burned 9Mbps discs are not compatible with all players. 8 is better, 6 will actually play on a Curtis Mathes.
If you choose a break point other than "Auto" in DVDA, it will more than likely fail.

Sincere thanks to both gents.

MV10 nailed it:

"If you choose a break point other than "Auto" in DVDA, it will more than likely fail"

That did it - can't thank you enough as I never would have factored that into any deduction and you saved me quite a bit of time and pain!!!

Quick question:

I am (for the short term) going to have a small batch of the DL duplicated via ISO image; soon thereafter I will go to a full DVD9 run. When I burn the ISO, will that include a break point or will the replicator assign it?

Thanks a mil once again!!!!!!!!

You said duplicated then replicated.
You also said a small batch so I assume they are being duplicated.
For reasons stated I will never deliver a burned DL disc to a customer.
That said, imgburn may be a better choice for mastering the iso; the break points work better than DVDA, but a lot of players will choke on ANY burned DL disc.

The best advice you will get is to deliver a 2-disc set.
Keep a DL copy for your own use.

Welp, I thought the 'DVDA auto layer break solution' was just that, but the identical glitch just again reared its very ugly head after numerous plays, power-down/ups, removing from player re-inserting etc.

Now I'm back to square one...I'm wondering if this is a problem specific to either the disc brand itself or the burned DL DVD, would the identical glitch occur or is said glitch telling me something else is amiss? Could it be the player?

Before I resort to forensically pulling this thing apart, I'd like to explore a hopefully simpler remedy.

Any suggestions are greatly appreciated!!

Burned DL discs are not compatible with all players.
I know of no "remedy" for that. Best of luck.

<<Burned DL discs are not compatible with all players.>>

Your "final-word," dismissive, "broad-stroke" reply doesn't take the following into account:

(1) I've burned and played numerous iterations of this same project as it developed (minus the recently added problematic title) on the same DL media without issue. Said title plays without concern on the same player when burned separately on the same brand/batch DL disc.

(2) Every other title, menu, link, etc., in the final iteration works flawlessly in this particular player, like butta' - not a nano-second of loading delay anywhere...even the #2 cell title after the layer-break loads instantly.

It doesn't stand to reason that your end-all argument " Burned DL discs are not compatible with all players" is necessarily correct or (at the very least) the complete answer to my situation. Why would the identical point in the DVD be problematic every time if the DL burned disc was incompatible with the player? Wouldn't I experience other problems as well, e.g. freezing on other titles, not loading altogether, etc.? Incompatibility (from my experience) usually translates to the damn thing not functioning at all or malfunctioning after an operation or two - not 99% fine for what can be an hour or more...than just one glitch.

As I've already stated, I may go ahead and bite the proverbial bullet and go directly to Replication (DVD9) for obvious reasons; however, wouldn't you agree that it is prudent to determine the cause of a title glitch before sending off what may be a flawed ISO or disc to the manufacturer and blowing a cool grand in the process????? How on Earth do I ascertain whether this problem is something more than flat-out incompatibly before going to replication based on your assertion??

MV10 - sincere thanks for the old college try - no need for you and I to go further on this.

Any additional input would be tremendously appreciated.

Steve, I apologize for not sharing my experience first; I'll stand by my statement as being correct, but none of the other adjectives you tossed about. It wasn't "exactly" a loaded statement I made, was it? It merely disagreed with your belief system.

1. Personal -- four of my six DVD players will play burned DL, using common "best practices" in preparing and burning. Two will not.

2. Commercial -- I produced a dozen or so midsized ($40k) performances over the past few years; properly authored and burned DVDs, from runs of ten to over 200 were sold legitimately after each show closing. None of the jobs were big enough to warrant replication. Of all the Single Layer runs, only two discs were exchanged -- both for older players that couldn't handle +R. Of the one show that was produced on Double Layer, the return rate was over 50% -- I had proofed each and every disc on one of my players before packaging. I ended up replacing the whole batch with two-disc sets. None were returned a second time, and the nonprofit didn't make a cent from that DVD project.

3. Not all players support burned double layer media. That is not "dismissive," but a second attempt to save you a lot of money, time, and backpedaling with your clientele. I wouldn't have said it twice if I didn't think it was important. Business all depends on delivering to the lowest common denominator, not the ideal consumer. I've never ruled out your project having "other" problems; if burned single layer discs show the same problem with a second title, that presents a second issue, but not the only one.

You are of course more than welcome to sell burned DL discs to your clientele, and I still wish you all the best of luck.
;?)

" Steve, I apologize for not sharing my experience first; I'll stand by my statement as being correct, but none of the other adjectives you tossed about. It wasn't "exactly" a loaded statement I made, was it? It merely disagreed with your belief system."

Your statement was not "loaded" per se, but as I expressed above, it seemed terse and dismissive of a host of other potential latent issues in its declarative finality. I guess what I'm saying in short-form is that I 'felt' that you "buttoned-up" the string and that my query would thereafter dangle into perpetuity. Forgive my tone, as it is often difficult to sense another person's demeanor in prose and my current frustration level is approaching critical mass with this thing.

" You are of course more than welcome to sell burned DL discs to your clientele, and I still wish you all the best of luck."

Let me for the record quickly define the nature of this particular DL project so we are clear:

This disc will accompany a tangible product that I've developed, have initial inventory and will manufacture in the future if it is deemed viable; it is not a stand-alone DVD offering. In short order I will be contacting a small number (approximately 50 to start) niche-specific individuals to achieve product placement with them (product re-sellers/distributors). For the moment, I have a very strict roll-out budget and don't want to commit to replication until I am reasonably satisfied that the product's placement will go as planned.

My initial thought was to send out a 1-up glossy printed promo piece along with what I can justifiably label a "beta" (DL DVD) disc showcasing the product and program in their full glory to interested potential re-sellers after initial contact. I don't believe a clearly labeled beta disc stating "Beta DVD - Please insert into a newer player for assured compatibility." would be a deal breaker, especially considering the merits of the product itself.

I would of course validate the "beta" disc in a brief cover letter, explaining that the product is hot off the proverbial presses, the manufactured retail-ready discs are in production and will be available upon the product's release in just a few weeks. I'm offering an exclusive "sneak-peak" before release, if you will.

I've found a manufacturer who is more than happy to address my concerns about burned DLs. They've offered to duplicate a couple of discs on their pro equipment directly from an ISO to allow me to do some testing. According to them, they have a very low rejection rate on their burned DLs and they're willing to dupe, print and send them to me on their dime to prove it. This outfit replicates as well and they've not tried to up sell me into a nearly 10 fold more expensive run. At this stage I am certainly willing to give it a shot.

As for splitting the disc into two - there is no logical break point - splitting would greatly downgrade the usability of the program; in short it would spoil it.

For now, I want to see if I can zero in on the glitch causing the single title issue via whatever means necessary - unfortunately, a simple fix like using DVDA auto LB won't cut it.

Thanks again for your advice - I wholly respect your opinion. I hope you're right about the compatibility.

PS - Checked the specs on my player and it does support DL.

How long is your program?
How many titles?

What manufacturer media are you using Steve? I've been using DL-DVD for years now with very few problems. I stick to either Verbatim DVD+R DL or Falcon media DVD+R DL. I found early on that any cheaper stuff failed. On 'problem' players I use DVD Shrink to reduce the size to fit a single layer disc. The reduction hit in quality isn't big enough for 'most' to notice.

MV10:

"How long is your program?
How many titles?"

The program is non-linear; it is intentionally segmented into (to address your second question) 98 titles, plus the intro title (simple .png with text copyright info) total = a maxed out 99. I don't have a precise video length tally, but I'm comfortable estimating that it's close to 2.5 hours. The current DVDA prepared DVD folder is just under 8GB.

All titles were rendered for DVDA in V11 with CBR of 8M, including the problematic title. Of late, I had 3 final timelines to complete the project containing a mix of HD and SD footage and I'd found that upping the bitrate to 9M made the down-sampled HD appear less aliased. I've since digested and heeded your warnings about exceeding 8M for sustained bitrates and I've re-rendered about 30 minutes of footage - 3 titles (the approximate total of the aforementioned 3 timelines) using VBR at a max of 9M, a constant of 8M, and a minimum of 4M and it looks respectable.

Arthur S:

"What manufacturer media are you using Steve? I've been using DL-DVD for years now with very few problems. I stick to either Verbatim DVD+R DL or Falcon media DVD+R DL. I found early on that any cheaper stuff failed. On 'problem' players I use DVD Shrink to reduce the size to fit a single layer disc."

I have TDK +R DL discs; I'd read somewhere that they were quite good (reviews hopefully not composed by TDK shills!) and hence my purchase of 50 of them. As I mentioned in my protracted post above, I am going to send this project to a manufacturer as an ISO on flash drive and get back a couple of professionally duplicated DL discs for testing. This should rule out media and PC burn/burner issues anyway.

"The reduction hit in quality isn't big enough for 'most' to notice."

For this project, I need the least amount of compression possible because most of the footage was shot on a Canon XL2, DV format / 60i (back in 2011). I'd always had beautiful image quality with that camera as everything else I'd shot was strictly progressive. I was highly disappointed when I initially captured the XL2's interlaced footage to my PC after returning from the cyclorama studio. The combination of the DV format's inherent high noise floor plus the XL2's poor handling of interlacing, coupled with the stark white walls of the cyclorama set make for a sub-par image at low to moderate bitrates - trust me I've experimented till my fingers were blistered! Hindsight being 20/20.....woulda, shoulda. coulda...yada yada...

Thanks for taking time to help me out fellas - can't thank you enough!

Just to mention, the problematic title on this DVD is the first title on a menu containing a total of 15 links (3 titles have 4 music tracks) - could that be a contributing factor??

I consider two titles to be an adventurous day.
Sincerely.

Another fortune cookie answer - swell.

Yes, and here's the last free fortune cookie:
When distributing video, playability wins. Always.

Don't be afraid to experiment and find out what works and what doesn't.

If you suspect that the project complexity is a factor, then play around with it and see if you can see some pattern.

The legal positions for the layer break are not obvious unless you know the rules. Sometimes padding is required. See for instance
http://mediachance.com/dvdlab/Helppro/layerbreak.htm

Perhaps some players are fussier than others about this.

MV10 - yeah yeah, your cookies have gone rather stale. Please don't waste any more on me - you're only (perhaps knowingly) rattling my cage at this point - cut me a break already - please.

Peter,

"Don't be afraid to experiment and find out what works and what doesn't.

If you suspect that the project complexity is a factor, then play around with it and see if you can see some pattern."

I'm afraid that this experiment will never end at this point.

The only pattern I can detect is that the single title causes a freeze-up on the one older player very intermittently. After powering-down and back up again, the player picks up where it left off just fine and thereafter will playback the title and the rest of the disc endlessly until I eject, power-down, let sit a minute or so and power-up again. It is so intermittent that I have to put considerable effort into recreating the freeze-up. It's just ONE TITLE - everything else is perfect!

My portable player manufactured in 2012 handles everything flawlessly, my PC USB burner/player has no issues, nor does a brand new Sony I picked up last week.

My big question is: Seeing that more recent devices handle the home-burned disc without a hitch, is there a lick of logic thinking...hoping that once replicated, this issue will cease?

"The legal positions for the layer break are not obvious unless you know the rules. Sometimes padding is required. See for instance
mediachance.com/dvdlab/Helppro/layerbreak.htm"

I used IMGBURN for the last couple of dupes; due to the segmentation of the disc's content, IMGBURN offered me multiple "excellent" (top choice) break points. I just wanted to add that the problem title is nowhere near the layer break.

I don't know what the heck else to try at this point other that awaiting the arrival of the pro-duplicated (from ISO) disc.

Thanks for freshening the thread Peter.